Monoup News Digest: Main Updates From Fintech Industry
Friday news digest from Monoup is live — here are the key stories of the week, short and to the point.
Chinese social platform TikTok is moving into several new verticals at once, evolving into a multi-platform with hotel and ticket booking, while simultaneously building its own fintech engine. TikTok is conquering Western markets using exactly the same model that proved successful in China — betting on “all-in-one” — and this is no accident or attempt to force a single approach onto every market, but a deliberate adaptation. Read on for details on the new functionality.
Also, Syria is returning to global fintech — the country's two main payment networks, Visa and Mastercard, are being restored right now. This means not only card payment availability within the country, but also potential for tourism, as holders of international cards will also be able to make purchases in Syria. Previously this was a major issue, and even the few who wanted to visit Syria faced difficulties booking and paying for their trips. More on this and other news below.
Fintech and Booking Platform — the New TikTok
TikTok is developing a new vertical, starting with the US market: hotel and travel bookings directly from videos.
The new functionality will allow content creators to earn booking commissions, while users will be able to instantly find the same hotels and experiences featured by their favorite creators. For now, these features will be tied to major platforms like Booking.com — but the scale of this rollout should not be underestimated. Where consumers previously had to search for locations from videos that weren't always tagged, they now don't need to search at all — simply tap on an object or location and you're taken straight to the booking link. This is literally a one-stop shop for experiences and an unambiguous driver for travel.
In parallel, TikTok is planning a transition to its own payment processing, to stop sharing commissions with payment providers. In Europe, the path has not been straightforward — ByteDance attempted to obtain a license in Ireland, but its accounts were closed due to AML concerns, forcing a restart in Luxembourg, which is still ongoing. In Brazil, the company has embarked on obtaining a financial license and appears to be making solid progress. Based on publicly available data, TikTok currently relies on Stripe, PayPal, Adyen and Worldpay, but this may change. In China, the company already has Douyin Pay; expansion in Western markets is more complex, but is progressing actively.
Visa and Mastercard Return to Syria
Following the lifting of sanctions, global payment networks are beginning to return to the country — SWIFT came first, and now the card schemes are joining.
The country spent more than 15 years under sanctions, completely cut off from global and Western finance. Over that time, many integrations became obsolete and had to be rebuilt from scratch. Mastercard and Visa launched almost simultaneously, between May 8th and 10th. The current stage is a testing phase — everything is already operational, but mass merchant onboarding and card issuance will begin slightly later.
Once the testing period concludes, cards issued in Syria will be usable worldwide, and holders of international cards will theoretically be able to transact within Syria. This creates a positive backdrop for travel and investment in a country that has seen neither for many years.
AI is Becoming a Driver of Layoffs in Fintech: What are the Implications?
A new wave of layoffs is intensifying across the financial sector day by day: BILL will cut 30% of its workforce in favor of AI implementation, while PayPal is laying off 20% — with nearly 24,000 employees currently, approximately 4,700 will go. Coinbase and Block announced similar plans slightly earlier. These are among the largest employers in the space and, equally important, key sources of technological progress and fintech development. Yet they are now moving toward cutting headcount, stating that they will be able to quickly replace people with agents and optimize their processes.
This sounds promising and may genuinely deliver savings in certain departments — but the potential risks deserve closer examination. For fintech, layoffs of this scale and pace could result in a large number of qualified specialists left without work, forced to pivot to new niches or accept roles worse than their previous ones. The majority of those affected are middle and lower-income earners. While Coinbase is also looking at management optimization, it is largely the rank-and-file positions that are suffering most right now.
Against this backdrop, we noticed an interesting data point from McDonald's Q1 2026 results: the company is reporting a decline in demand among middle and lower-income consumers, and the need to introduce discounts and cheaper menu items to maintain purchasing power. More and more people are choosing value options over individually priced premium items. And while McDonald's overall revenue grew, the company is flagging these trends — possibly earlier than anyone else.
AI will not become a consumer of services, particularly in food service, and optimization in one place may translate into deterioration in another. Meanwhile, few companies are yet talking about how to engage laid-off specialists in AI-related work, or how to help them retrain.
Visa, Mastercard and PayPal Under Pressure from the UK Regulator
The FCA has launched an investigation into the payment networks and digital wallet PayPal, suspecting them of antitrust violations and collusion — which could expose all parties to fines of up to 10% of annual turnover.
The regulator has requested details from the companies on agreements signed between them, to determine whether any conditions oblige PayPal to prioritize Visa and Mastercard cards for wallet top-ups.
According to the FCA, the popularity of digital wallets in the UK has surged sharply — from 8% of transactions in 2019 to 29% in 2023, and continues to grow, which has immediately heightened regulatory interest in this sector. The FCA's concern, specifically, is that open banking is not becoming the dominant top-up method for the country's most popular wallet. This may reflect user choice — or it may be the result of pressure from the card schemes. That is precisely what the investigation aims to determine.
If PayPal is receiving preferential terms or discounts from card networks in exchange for keeping users on cards, this constitutes anticompetitive collusion. Discounts on card top-ups or more prominent placement of card payment options on the checkout page could be viewed negatively in this context.
That's the Monoup news roundup for today. Stay on top of fintech developments and read our analyses, where we share professional perspective on the potential impact of these stories on the industry — today and in the future — rather than simply reporting what has already happened. Subscribe to our Telegram channel for fast notifications!
